DeLeon to the rescue for Eagles
Halftime came at just the right time for Adris DeLeon.
Eastern Washington’s flashy first-year junior guard, after struggling through the first 20 minutes of Monday night’s non-conference men’s basketball matchup against Portland, put his foot on the Pilots’ throat following intermission and never considered stepping away in leading the Eagles to an impressive 84-75 win in front of an announced crowd of 1,803 at Reese Court.
After scoring just two points and committing four turnovers prior to intermission, DeLeon erupted for 12 points in the second half and took the game over in the final 3 1/2 minutes as Eastern (5-8) turned back a Portland team (3-8) that was coming off a solid all-around effort in a 67-63 road loss to Washington on Sunday.
“He’s getting there,” first-year Eagles coach Kirk Earlwine said of DeLeon, a 5-foot-11 transfer from College of Southern Idaho. “The first half he didn’t play very well – four turnovers in 10 minutes – and we made sure he realized that at halftime.
“Then he came out and played very well in the second half.”
DeLeon, who came in averaging 10.7 point per game, made 4 of 7 second-half basket tries and also handed out three of his team-high five assists as the Eagles battled back from a 36-32 halftime deficit to win their second straight game.
But he was at his best in the final minutes when he stole the ball off the dribble from UP’s Sherrard Watson and fed teammate Gary Gibson for a wide-open 3-pointer in transition that put EWU up 70-61 with just over three minutes left in the game.
DeLeon was then fouled on a difficult drive down the lane, converted the three-point play and, on the Eagles’ next possession, broke free from Portland’s press and scored off a long inbounds pass to make it 75-63 and put the Pilots away.
“Coach got on me pretty good in the locker room at halftime,” DeLeon admitted. “He told me I needed to help make my teammates better, and I just followed his lead.”
“Adris has the capability of getting shots for the other guys on our team, and that’s what we need him to do,” Earlywine said. “He sometimes thinks his primary responsibility is to get a shot for Adris, but I want him to understand that his primary job is to get shots for the other guys on the team.
“His will come to him.”
Along with DeLeon’s big second-half effort, the Eagles also got 18 points from junior guard Milan Stanojevic, who knocked down 5 of 10 3-point attempts, and 16 points and 10 rebounds from senior forward Kellen Williams, who posted his fifth double-double of the year and third in his last four games.
The Eagles shot a season-high 56.3 percent (27 of 48) from the field to offset the 28-point performance of Portland’s sophomore guard Nik Raivio.
Afteward, Earlywine was at a loss to explain his team’s uncharacteristic offensive outburst, especially after watching the Eagles score just 49 points against Idaho eight days earlier.
“We have spent time working on our offense, and we spent a little bit of extra time shooting the ball,” he said. “But I really don’t have a logical explanation on how this team can go to Moscow and score just 49 points and then score 84 tonight – against a (Portland) team that I thought was playing really well coming in.”
Eastern will play the third of six straight home games Saturday when it opens Big Sky Conference play against Portland State at 7:05 p.m. at Reese Court.